Octavia Nasr: An error of judgment?
How do news organisations separate public perception of the journalist from the
individual on social media? Journalists all over the world are tweeting away,
presumably acquiring a following that helps build their brand. They comment on stuff
happening on their beat, and occasionally offer cute personal takes on kids or gardens.
That should be good for the newspaper or TV channel.
But sometimes things go wrong. When a senior editor at CNN lost her job last
fortnight for expressing personal admiration for a Hizbollah leader, it revived a debate
in the West on policies regarding social media. The New York Timesreported that
CNN removed its senior editor for Middle Eastern affairs, Octavia Nasr, from her job
after she put out a Twitter message saying that she respected the Shiite cleric the
Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, who died on Sunday. CNN felt the
heat after there were sharp reactions from Israel. The broadcaster said it was an error
of judgement on Nasr's part and announced rather quickly that she was leaving the
company.
Harmless so far
In our blithe, rule-free media universe, blogging or tweeting by a journalists has not
become an issue yet, partly because much of what is on Twitter is harmless, even
vacuous. There is a lot of “watch such and such programme” from our TV
anchorpersons, or “read such and such” from our editors. The rest is comments that
feed a fan following. Star News anchor Deepak Chaurasia's Twitter feeds have such
profundities as “When Delhi will find the solutions from rain trafic jam” or “Hope the
Delhi govt is not treating the games like ghar ki shaadi”. That is, when his tweets are
not about the Star Anchor Hunt. Sagarika Ghose tells her followers what the topic will
be that day on her programme Face the Nation or offers opinions on a movie or book.
But elsewhere a rulebook is evolving on the use of social media. There are some
interesting readings on the subject on the Net by both academics and journalists.
News organisations are keen to have their staff use Facebook or LinkedIn or Twitter
as reporting tools but have reservations about their expressing personal views on
these, especially political ones. The New York Times policy on social networking
sites explains why: “If you have or are getting a Facebook page leave blank the
section about your political views, in accordance with the ethical journalism
admonition to do nothing that might cast doubt on your or the Times's political
impartiality in reporting the news.”
Other publications such as the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal have also
formulated policies on social media. The Post came up with guidelines last year after
Raju Narisetti (formerly founding editor of Mint, currently one of the managing
editors of the Post) expressed views on his Twitter feed on US government spending
on the war. And on another occasion, on a retirement age for politicians. The paper's
executive editor gave a reason similar to that of NYT: Reporters and editors should
not express views that can be considered as political. Narisetti closed his Twitter
account. Writing on the subject, the paper's ombudsman had a column titled “Print era
shackles for a Twitter world?” which pretty much summed up how critics see
restrictions on social media interaction.
What makes this odd is a parallel media ethics trend which says it is perfectly alright
for media outlets to be ‘committed' in their coverage, or coloured shall we say, by an
ideology. Newspapers have always been identifiable with specific political leanings,
both here and abroad, broadcasters with the exception of the Fox network are
expected to be impartial. But Guy Black, executive director of the Telegraph Media
Group, said recently in an interview that given the multiplicity of satellite TV
channels there is really no reason why channels with different political leanings
should not be on air. (In his previous job he was director of the Press Complaints
Commission in the U.K.) The distinction seems to be that a media group can be
identified with a leaning or a sympathy, an individual employee, however senior,
should not be. That would invite charges of inherent bias.
Kashmir online
But there are places where such self censorship does not apply, and Kashmir is one of
them. Last fortnight's events in Kashmir saw the state go without newspapers for two
days, because curfew passes of all local reporters were cancelled. But TV crews and
reporters from Delhi were brought in and taken by the army on its flag march so that
there could be ‘reporting' on the state for the rest of the country despite the curfew.
So social media came into play in two ways. A local journalist with a blog called
kashmirreporter.blogspot.com lashed out at the ‘take' offered by the national media
and commentators, calling it embedded journalism, and did so on Facebook. He
offered his own take for the solution of the Kashmir crisis. Yet another Kashmiri
journalist wrote on facebook that embedded journalism had been introduced for the
first time in Kashmir. Whats more, correspondents of national papers posted
photographs that were not carried by their newspapers on their Facebook pages.
And in a throwback to Kosovo in 1999 which saw citizens reporting a war that
journalists could not access, Kashmiris, including students, went online in the days
that newspapers were closed to describe what was happening in various parts of
Kashmir. In a state where smses remain banned from the end of June this year, social
media now provides the only outlet for Kashmiri citizens and journalists alike. And on
it, they are defiant in the views they express.
© Copyright 2000 - 2009 The Hindu
Volume 27 - Issue 15 :: Jul. • Contents
17-30, 2010
INDIA'S NATIONAL MAGAZINE
from the publishers of THE HINDU
SOCIAL ISSUES
Death for love
T.K. RAJALAKSHMI
in Sonepat and Delhi
Lack of governmental action to stop honour killings comes up
for criticism even as the crime continues unabated.
SUSHIL KUMAR VERMA
The police removing the body of a girl from Wazirpur who was
found dead in a car at Ashok Vihar in New Delhi on June 22.
NOTHING, not even the death penalty awarded by a Karnal court
to five people in the Manoj-Babli case on March 30 this year, seems
to deter honour killings in India. In the past few months, there has
been a spate of murders in the name of protecting family or
community honour in areas adjoining the national capital region.
In the latest such incident, Sham Mohammad, 18, a Muslim, and his
friend, Reena, 16, a Hindu, were found dead on the premises of a
school in Samain village of Fatehabad district in Haryana on July 4.
The boy had been bludgeoned to death and one of his eyes was
almost gouged out, while the girl had apparently been forced to
consume poison. The police arrested the girl's maternal uncles and a
few others in connection with the case.
The youngsters had studied in the same school and when the
families came to know of their friendship, the boy was sent away to
Punjab and the girl discontinued her studies. Sham had come to his
native place for a vacation when the incident occurred.
Significantly, persistent interventions by organisations such as the
All India Democratic Women's Association (AIDWA) have
emboldened people to report cases of honour killings to the police.
But governments have been accused of showing a lack of will in
dealing with the situation. Recently, the Supreme Court too voiced
its concern over the lack of governmental action to stop honour
killings.
On June 21, taking cognisance of a public interest petition filed by
the non-governmental organisation Shakti Vahini, a Division Bench
of the Supreme Court issued notice to the Centre and eight State
governments – Haryana, Punjab, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand,
Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh – seeking an
action plan. The NGO argued that while killing for honour was an
extreme reaction, victims were often subjected to long-term, low-
level physical abuse and bullying as a punishment for “bringing
dishonour on the family”. Such abuse included battery, torture,
mutilation, rape, forced marriage, and imprisonment within the
home. These premeditated crimes were intended to protect the
family honour by preventing and punishing violations of
community norms of behaviour, especially sexual behaviour of
women.
Many a time, the petition said, harassment and threats drove young
couples to suicide. The law enforcement agencies, it said, were
mute spectators, intervening only after an incident had happened.
They were caught in the “midst of lack of political will to act
against such feudal forces as these forces also represent vote
banks”, it said.
The petition demanded that the Supreme Court lay down a series of
guidelines for law enforcement agencies to deal with such crimes
on the pattern of the guidelines for combating sexual harassment at
the workplace. It also pointed out how the States had failed to
comply with the directions issued by the court in 2006 ( Lata Singh
vs State of Uttar Pradesh and Another) to ensure that no one
harassed or threatened couples who married out of caste or religion.
The court directed that the police should institute criminal
proceedings against anyone who issued or carried out threats of
violence. “There is nothing honourable in these killings and, in fact,
they are nothing but barbaric and shameful acts of murder
committed by brutal, feudal-minded persons who deserve harsh
punishment,” it said.
The petitioner contended that as a state party to the United Nations
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
against Women (CEDAW), the Government of India was under
obligation to see that discrimination against women in matters
relating to family and marriage was eliminated. This included
ensuring that informal decision-making bodies such as khap
panchayats (caste councils) were restrained from enforcing their
dicta and interfering with the right of women to choose their
spouses, the petition said. Also, as a signatory to the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, India had an obligation to protect the
lives, rights and liberty of individuals and protect them from such
heinous crimes, it said.
There has been a strident demand, especially after the Karnal court
judgment, to amend the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, in order to
prevent same- gotra marriages. This has been at the centre of the
latest debate on honour killings. On June 19, the Delhi High Court
dismissed a petition demanding a ban on same- gotra marriages.
Castigating the petitioner for “wasting the time of the court”, the
judges demanded to know which Hindu text prescribed banning of
sagotra (same clan) marriages.
The petition in the High Court was filed soon after the Supreme
Court dismissed a similar one on the grounds of jurisdiction.
Arguing that same- gotra marriages were violative of fundamental
rights and against Hindu tradition, the petitioner wanted the court to
appoint a commission that would suggest amendments to the Hindu
Marriage Act in order to prohibit such marriages.
But not all honour killings in the recent past were instigated by
caste councils. For instance, on June 25, two cousins, aged 14 and
12, of Mohalla Kot in the old city of Sonepat district were battered
and strangled allegedly by their own grandmother and paternal
uncles. Their bodies were thrown amidst hyacinths on the
embankment of the Western Yamuna Canal.
SANDEEP SAXENA
MEMBERS OF VARIOUS women's organisations
demonstrating at India Gate in New Delhi against honour
killings, on June 30.
Mohalla Kot is a part of Sonepat that is cut off from the city. Its
narrow bylanes make access to it in any big four-wheel vehicle
difficult. People here keep to themselves and, not surprisingly, very
few were willing to talk about the murder of the two children. The
grandmother and the uncles are reported to have said that they
killed the girls for having an illicit liaison with their 16-year-old
stepbrother, who has been arrested and booked for rape.
There has not been much sympathy for the slain children either
from the police or the larger society. Media reports have constantly
referred to the girls as having had an “affair” with their cousin.
Even the police viewed the incident as a normal outcome of a
wrong that had been committed by the girls.
“It is not a case of honour killing. It is a case of illicit relations. The
family has a history of its members being arrested under the
Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act,” K.K. Rao,
Sonepat's Superintendent of Police, told Frontline. According to a
section of the police, the girls were “of age” and not minors though
the post-mortem and school records revealed otherwise. They had
been subjected to sexual intercourse as well. But whether the
arrested minor boy is the real culprit or not is now under the
scanner.
The circumstances in which the girls lived were pathetic, to say the
least. The father of the 14-year-old girl was in jail and the mother
was living away from home. The parents of the other girl, too, were
living away from the family. A relative of one of the slain girls said
the children were innocent.
The Wazirpur murders
The triple murders in Wazirpur, near Delhi, were equally horrific.
The landed Gujjar and Jat communities in the village, an island in
the midst of posh colonies in Ashok Vihar, became wealthy
overnight, thanks to the real estate boom. Shops here display the
latest brands and swanky cars whizz past its roads. Most of the
houses are multi-storeyed. Young boys and girls dressed up in the
latest fashion move around with nonchalance.
“The mentality of the residents of Wazirpur village is mediaeval
despite all the modern amenities,” said a resident. “The boys here
do nothing. They just roam around. There is a lot of easy money as
land prices have gone up tremendously.”
The village has a chaupal (a place for panchayat and public
meetings), used mostly by the men of the dominant castes, as in
much of rural North India, where the elders sit and smoke their
hookahs. It was in this setting that Kuldeep, a Rajput boy, and
Monica, a Gujjar, decided to tie the knot four years ago. They were
the first couple to have married out of caste in the 400-year-old
village.
On June 21, two of the girl's cousins, in their early 20s, killed them
in the name of honour. The next day, another girl, a cousin of
Monica, too, was found murdered. The boys, who confessed to the
crime, said they could not bear the taunts of the villagers after the
girls had supposedly “shamed” them, one by marrying out of caste
and the other by aspiring to be a model.
Less than a week earlier, a girl and a boy belonging to two different
castes were electrocuted by the girl's parents and maternal uncles in
a colony in north-east Delhi. These are not just stray incidents.
In nearby Haryana, on June 21, two teenagers were found murdered
in a village in Bhiwani district. Six members of the girl's family
were arrested. The girl was a student of Class XI. Six days later, a
couple belonging to two different castes in Dheera village killed
themselves by jumping in front of a train following resistance to
their relationship.
In April this year, in Bhainswal village in Sonepat, a boy strangled
his 16-year-old sister for having a relationship with a boy of the
same village. A day later, the girl's friend committed suicide. In
October 2009, a Sonepat couple, who married from the same gotra,
had to face the community's ire. The man was killed and his wife
raped after being lured to a place in Delhi.
It is clear that the matter of honour killings cannot be dealt with by
law alone. There also has to be some form of social reform plan on
the agenda of political parties, in addition to an attitudinal change in
the people. Significantly, such crimes are committed more often in
States that have skewed child sex ratios and a high rate of crime
against women and children, and where distributive justice in both
economic and social terms is very low.
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